# what linux distro for older amd/nvidia laptop.. **URL:** \ **Category:** NYSpeed Off Topic\ **Created:** [November 24, 2011, 6:19pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642 "2011-11-24T18:19:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![JustinH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9fc29f/32.png) [@JustinH](https://forums.speedlife.net/u/JustinH)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2011, 6:19pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642/1 "2011-11-24T18:19:20Z")
Can anyone recommend a linux distro to put on an older laptop? This is a windows xp era HP laptop with an nvidia card in it. The nvidia card does not play well with any of the new versions of ubuntu, and I’m tired of setting grub command lines and trying to get the generic vga driver to work. I just need something to put on there for my father to run firefox and look at facebook. ---
**Author:** ![honda4life](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex034/user_avatar/forums.speedlife.net/honda4life/32/5300_2.png) [@honda4life](https://forums.speedlife.net/u/honda4life)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2011, 6:24pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642/2 "2011-11-24T18:24:51Z")
Try mint any more specs on the laptop model it is? ---
**Author:** ![JustinH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9fc29f/32.png) [@JustinH](https://forums.speedlife.net/u/JustinH)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2011, 6:28pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642/3 "2011-11-24T18:28:11Z")
I think it has a single core celeron or a single core amd sempron cpu in it. ---------- Post added at 09:28 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:26 PM ---------- I’m looking at the lightweight version of mint linux right now, 32 bit. Seems appropriate. ---
**Author:** ![honda4life](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex034/user_avatar/forums.speedlife.net/honda4life/32/5300_2.png) [@honda4life](https://forums.speedlife.net/u/honda4life)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2011, 12:17pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642/4 "2011-11-25T12:17:32Z")
> [@JustinH](#): > > I think it has a single core celeron or a single core amd sempron cpu in it. > > ---------- Post added at 09:28 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:26 PM ---------- > > I’m looking at the lightweight version of mint linux right now, 32 bit. Seems appropriate. Try mint out and report back ---
**Author:** ![boardjnky4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/96bed5/32.png) [@boardjnky4](https://forums.speedlife.net/u/boardjnky4)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2011, 2:52pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642/5 "2011-11-25T14:52:53Z")
Xubuntu was always a good option…Just make sure when you set it up that you delete all the crap you don’t need. ---
**Author:** ![evane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/6bbea6/32.png) [@evane](https://forums.speedlife.net/u/evane)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 12:14pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642/6 "2011-11-27T12:14:30Z")
That should be able to drive Gnome3 or Unity just fine if you want to use Ubuntu(Unity) or Fedora/OpenSuse (Gnome3). I don’t foresee that CPU being a problem, if you have a crappy GPU it will cause issues, also you should have 4gb of memory to run comfortably. With all that it depends on what you want and intend on doing with this machine, Unity and Gnome3 are cool but I think still are hampered by weird bugs. Most linux users I know are still using Gnome2 and some have switched to XFCE. ---------- Post added at 03:14 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:13 PM ---------- Just noticed on original post, what Nvidia GPU do you have in that laptop you may need the legacy package. ---
**Author:** ![JustinH](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9fc29f/32.png) [@JustinH](https://forums.speedlife.net/u/JustinH)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 12:17pm UTC](https://forums.speedlife.net/t/what-linux-distro-for-older-amd-nvidia-laptop/218642/7 "2011-11-27T12:17:20Z")
I ended up putting Puppy linux on it, it would work fine with the VESA graphics option. It was the only distribution that would prompt me to test several graphics options, then it would write the code necessary into grub for the graphics to work. This distro sucks, but works good for just running google chrome (what my father wanted).